The State Elections

Pennsylvania. "Friend OHIO, I thought thee hadst got rid
of this noxious weed, as I of mine; and yet I see an ugly Pumpkin
growing upon the land."

Ohio. "Not upon my land, I guess! It's the
VALLANDIGHAM PUNKIN as I've tossed over into my neighbor's field, and
he's bin and tuck root, you see, among the Canady thistles!"

Artist: Henry Louis Stephens

leading Peace Democrat (“Copperhead”), Clement Vallandigham was one
of the most vocal and tenacious critics of the Lincoln administration
during the Civil War.When
Union officials expelled him from the North, he ended up in Canada where
he directed his unsuccessful campaign for the Ohio governorship.In this cartoon, the personifications of Pennsylvania and Ohio
discuss ridding themselves of the noxious growth of Copperheads like
Vallandigham and George W. Woodward, the Democratic gubernatorial
nominee in Pennsylvania.

Clement Laird Vallandigham was
born in 1820 in New Lisbon, Ohio, the son of a Presbyterian minister and
schoolteacher.He was
educated in the classics at his father’s school before entering
Jefferson College (Pennsylvania) in 1837.Financial difficulties forced him to drop out after a year and to
take a job as principal at Union Academy (Maryland).In 1840, he returned to Jefferson College for the fall term, but
left in January after a quarrel.He
studied law with an older brother in Ohio, and in 1842 was admitted to
the state bar.

Vallandigham got involved in
politics at an early age, campaigning for the Democrats in the 1840
election.He served as a delegate to the Democratic county convention
the next year, and then was elected without opposition to the Ohio state
legislature in 1845.Two
years later, he moved to Dayton to become a partner at a law firm, as
well as editor and part owner of the Western
Empire newspaper.In
1849, Vallandigham became active again in politics, losing a race for
judge.Thereafter, Ohio Democrats nominated him for lieutenant
governor (1851) and Congress (1852, 1854, 1856), but he lost every
election.He contested the
last narrow defeat, and finally in May 1858 the
Democratically-controlled U.S. House of Representatives disqualified
enough Republican votes to give Vallandigham a victory.It was bittersweet, however; Congress adjourned the next day,
ending the term.He was
elected in the fall, though, by a slim margin, and then reelected in
1860.After gerrymandering
by the state legislature, he lost in 1862.

Vallandigham adhered to a
Jacksonian philosophy throughout his political life—states’ rights,
strict constitutional interpretation, low tariffs, and anti-national
bank.The conservative
political philosophy of Edmund Burke and Presbyterian Calvinism were
also major influences on his thought.Although Vallandigham admitted that slavery was immoral, he
opposed abolitionism on political and constitutional principles and
resisted equal rights for black Americans on racist grounds.He was a Unionist who repudiated secession; yet he also opposed
the Union war effort and became a leader of the Peace wing of the
Democratic Party (“Copperheads”).

Vallandigham’s ardent,
persistent criticism of the Lincoln administration and the war caused
one of the major political controversies of the Civil War.In 1863, Ohio’s military governor, General Ambrose Burnside,
issued an order against public expressions of sympathy with the
Confederate enemy.Considering
that policy to be a violation of the 1st Amendment’s protection of
free speech, Vallandigham tested it by delivering a vitriolic speech
condemning the military decree and “King” Lincoln’s war to free
blacks and enslave whites.Consequently,
the former congressman was arrested, tried, and convicted in a military
court.The incident
provoked outrage in the Northern Democratic press and undermined War
Democrats’ support of the Lincoln administration.

Vallandigham appealed the case
to the U.S. Supreme Court on a writ of certiorari.In Ex parte Vallandigham
(1864), the Supreme Court unanimously denied the petition, citing lack
of jurisdiction, and thereby avoided the constitutional question of the
military arrest and trial of civilians.Lincoln commuted his prison sentence to exile in the Confederacy.Vallandigham soon left the South for Canada, at which time the
Ohio Democrats, infuriated over his arrest, nominated him for governor.
He directed his campaign from Canada ("Canady" in this cartoon
means "Canadian"), but lost overwhelming to the
Republican nominee. Woodward also
lost the gubernatorial election in Pennsylvania.

When Vallandigham returned clandestinely to Ohio in June 1864 and again began speaking out
against the war, Lincoln told military and civilian officials to ignore
him. At the Democratic National
Convention in Chicago in August 1864, Vallandigham was instrumental in
convincing delegates to add a peace plank to their party platform.The plank called for an immediate halt to the fighting, followed
by peace negotiations between the Union and the Confederacy.The Democratic presidential nominee, General George McClellan, repudiated the peace plank, but the Republicans used it to
paint the Democrats as Confederate sympathizers.Vallandigham campaigned for McClellan and Democratic candidates
in Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and New York, but his party lost both
the presidency and more seats in Congress.

At the close of the Civil War,
Vallandigham helped form the “New Departure” wing of the Democratic
Party.He and like-minded
Democrats argued that their party could only return to power by
accepting the results of the Civil War and Reconstruction as
irreversible facts and by looking to the future.While still holding to strict constitutionalism, states’
rights, low tariffs, and resisting racial equality in social affairs,
Vallandigham supported moderate Reconstruction policies, civil service
reform, a wealth tax, hard monetary policies, and labor-capital
cooperation.Running on
those issues, he lost elections to the U.S. Senate (1867, 1869) and the House of Representatives (1868).

In
the post-war years, Vallandigham resumed his law practice, earning
renown as a talented trial lawyer and gaining a large clientele.In what would be his last case, in 1871 he acted as defense
attorney for a man charged with murder.The unusual defense was that the victim had shot himself
accidentally.Vallandigham
dramatically recreated the alleged accident with what he thought was an
unloaded pistol.The gun,
however, was loaded, and Vallandigham shot himself accidentally,
suffering an agonizing death several hours later.On his deathbed he reaffirmed his Calvinist belief in
predestination.